Canada’s Women’s Voice and Leadership programme: supporting women's rights organisations for a better future

Abstract

In 2017, Canada launched the Women's Voice and Leadership programme to enhance the capacity and sustainability of women's rights organisations (WROs) and feminist movements globally. This initiative supports WROs through direct funding, organisational capacity strengthening and movement bolstering to foster gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls.

This content is part of the TIPs In Practice series, developed for the peer-learning platform Development Co-operation TIPs ∙ Tools Insights Practices, which offers insights on how to make policies, systems, and partnerships more effective.

Challenge

Despite their central role in advancing gender equality and reducing poverty, women’s rights organisations (WROs) and feminist movements, especially those based in developing countries, face significant funding gaps. Less than 1% of official development assistance globally, or USD 481 million on average per year in 2022-23, is provided to support the sustainability and effectiveness of these organisations. Perceptions of risk are high and WROs receive limited institutional support, preventing them from strengthening their capacities to manage large amounts of funding. WROs often must deal with short-term, project-based funding, which limits their ability to make long-term investments in their communities and their organisations.

Approach

In 2017, Canada launched the Women’s Voice and Leadership (WVL) Program to provide substantial, long-term support to WROs for their organisational growth and to advance the rights of women and girls around the world. The programme is rooted in a feminist and locally driven approach that aims to shift decision-making power to local organisations. It also takes an intersectional approach across a variety of social, cultural and economic contexts. Canada initially committed CAD 150 million over five years and then renewed its commitment in 2023, adding CAD 195 million for the next five years and pledging CAD 43.3 million each year thereafter.

Key features of the WVL programme include:

• Multi-year core grants. These grants provide predictable and sustained funding. By avoiding thematic requirements, the programme thus enables WROs to address their unique priorities and context-specific issues.

• Fast, flexible and responsive grants. These grants enable WROs to respond quickly to emerging opportunities and needs, such as the response to the COVID-19 pandemic, or an unexpected need for advocacy, especially in conflict and crisis contexts.

• Organisational capacity-strengthening support. Tailored capacity-strengthening activities respond to WROs’ self-identified priorities such as strategic planning, advocacy, resource mobilisation and leadership as well as care and well-being to address stress and burnout among staff and volunteers.

• Funding to local organisations. Each WVL project transfers the maximum amount of funding directly to WROs, with the goal of providing as close to 50% of the project budget as possible, with a 37% cap on implementing partners’ management costs.

• Peer learning and movement bolstering. Through its support for the sharing of learning, the WVL programme fosters collaboration and networking among WROs, enhancing their collective impact and advocacy efforts.

Results

By providing quality funding and capacity development support to WROs and feminist movements in partner countries, the WVL programme has enhanced their contribution to inclusive, sustainable development. Key results include:

• Strengthened organisational sustainability. Supported WROs were better able to deliver on their gender-responsive mandates and to access new funding from other development partners. Under the WVL Nigeria project, 93 WROs secured 35 new grants totalling almost CAD 1.8 million from international donors and philanthropic organisations.

• Expanded programming and advocacy activities. WROs have improved their ability to leverage traditional and social media and to integrate feminist approaches into their programming. Under the WVL Peru project, the Legal Office for the Defence of Women’s Rights provided evidence in a hearing before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in a case involving alleged discrimination against a lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex plus (LBTQI+) activist on the grounds of sexual orientation. This resulted in a historic win for the LBTQI+ community.

• Sustained activities during the COVID-19 pandemic. WROs were able to provide relief supplies to affected communities, advocate for gender-sensitive responses from governments, and buy basic information technology equipment that enabled them to shift their programming and advocacy online. In Senegal, WROs offered prevention and psychosocial care for victims of gender-based violence and for women healthcare workers during the crisis.

• Stronger relationships between WROs and public institutions that enhance WROs’ ability to influence policy and decision making. Partners in WVL Sri Lanka took part in drafting the National Policy on Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment that was formally adopted by the government of Sri Lanka.

Lessons learnt

• WROs know what is needed and what works in their community. Core support enables WROs to invest in their own capacities. It also allows WROs to focus on what matters most to their communities and respond to emerging challenges effectively, without external partners imposing their priorities.

• Combining core support and tailored capacity strengthening is effective, but sustainability requires long-term investment. A combined approach enabled the WVL programme to respond to the needs of WROs in diverse contexts. However, further efforts are needed for WROs to secure sustained and diversified funding sources and to achieve the non-financial dimensions of capacity they see as critical to their sustainability – for example, connections and donor visibility, care and security, organisational systems and processes, and leadership.

• Reducing barriers to access requires a multifaceted approach. Lowering administrative hurdles related to contracting, due diligence and reporting helps smaller and emerging women’s groups access funding while local implementing partners can facilitate access to structurally excluded groups. Comprehensive reform to risk management approaches by funders and implementing partners is necessary for feminist programming and direct support to WROs. Addressing local laws and eligibility criteria that restrict funding to unregistered organisations is also essential for inclusive support.

Further information

Global Affairs Canada (2017), Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy, https://www.international.gc.ca/world-monde/issues_development-enjeux_developpement/priorities-priorites/policy-politique.aspx?lang=eng#6.

Global Affairs Canada (2025), Women’s Voice and Leadership Program, https://www.international.gc.ca/world-monde/issues_development-enjeux_developpement/gender_equality-egalite_des_genres/wvl_projects-projets_vlf.aspx?lang=eng.

Global Affairs Canada (2024), “Renewal of the Women’s Voice and Leadership Program: What we heard report”, https://www.international.gc.ca/transparency-transparence/global-health-sante-mondiale/women-voice-leadership-voix-leadership-femms.aspx?lang=eng.

Global Affairs Canada (2022), Women’s Voice and Leadership Program: Formative Evaluation, https://www.international.gc.ca/transparency-transparence/assets/pdfs/audit-evaluation-verification/2022/2022-05-wvl-vlf-en.pdf.

Global Affairs Canada (2017), Canada’s Policy for Civil Society Partnerships for International Assistance – A Feminist Approach, https://www.international.gc.ca/world-monde/issues_development-enjeux_developpement/priorities-priorites/civil_policy-politique_civile.aspx?lang=eng.

OECD resources

OECD (2025), OECD Development Co-operation Peer Reviews: Canada 2025, OECD Development Co-operation Peer Reviews, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/fcd70ea1-en.

OECD (2022), Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women and Girls: DAC Guidance for Development Partners, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/0bddfa8f-en.

OECD (2022), “Gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls”, Fundamentals, Development Co-operation TIPs – Tools, Insights, Practices https://www.oecd.org/en/publications/development-co-operation-tips-tools-insights-practices_be69e0cf-en/guidance-on-gender-equality-and-the-empowerment-of-women-and-girls_40c718bd-en.html.

To learn more about Canada’s development co-operation, see: 

OECD, “Canada”, in Development Co-operation Profiles, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/aa7e3298-en (accessed on 13 March 2025).

See more In Practice examples from Canada here: https://www.oecd.org/development-cooperation-learning?tag-key+partner=canada#search. 

This work is published under the responsibility of the Secretary-General of the OECD. The opinions expressed and arguments employed herein do not necessarily reflect the official views of the Member countries of the OECD.

This document, as well as any data and map included herein, are without prejudice to the status of or sovereignty over any territory, to the delimitation of international frontiers and boundaries and to the name of any territory, city or area.

Photo: Let Us Grow, a WVL-South Africa grantee, led a march on International Human Rights Day, December 10, 2021. © Colleen Lowe Morna / Gender Links.

© OECD 2025

Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

This work is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. By using this work, you accept to be bound by the terms of this licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Attribution – you must cite the work.

Translations – you must cite the original work, identify changes to the original and add the following text: In the event of any discrepancy between the original work and the translation, only the text of original work should be considered valid.

Adaptations – you must cite the original work and add the following text: This is an adaptation of an original work by the OECD. The opinions expressed and arguments employed in this adaptation should not be reported as representing the official views of the OECD or of its Member countries.

Third-party material – the licence does not apply to third-party material in the work. If using such material, you are responsible for obtaining permission from the third party and for any claims of infringement.

You must not use the OECD logo, visual identity or cover image without express permission or suggest the OECD endorses your use of the work.

Any dispute arising under this licence shall be settled by arbitration in accordance with the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) Arbitration Rules 2012. The seat of arbitration shall be Paris (France). The number of arbitrators shall be one.